1923–2000 · New York City
The New York timbalero and bandleader who brought the timbales to the front of the stage, wrote "Oye Como Va" and recorded more than 100 albums.
- Played with
- Machito, Mongo Santamaría, Celia Cruz, Eddie Palmieri
Tito Puente (1923–2000) wanted to be a dancer. "I thought I was Fred Astaire with Ginger Rogers," he said. A bicycle accident hurt his ankle and ended that dream. For half a century he was one of the best-known faces of Latin music. He led one of the great orchestras of the Palladium era, wrote "Oye Como Va," recorded more than 100 albums and won six Grammys. They called him "El Rey del Timbal," the King of the Timbales.
From Spanish Harlem to the Palladium
Ernesto Antonio Puente Jr. was born at Harlem Hospital in New York City on April 20, 1923, to Ernesto and Ercilia Puente, and grew up in Spanish Harlem. He took piano lessons as a kid and danced with his sister. After the accident he turned to the drums, starting on trap set before he settled on the timbales.
A lot of what he learned, he learned in the neighborhood. "That's where you get your experience, in the street," he said. He listened to the big bands too. "I was always into jazz — Stan Kenton, Woody Herman, Duke Ellington." As a teenager he was already playing with the Noro Morales orchestra. He also played with Machito's Afro-Cubans. He always named Machito and Mario Bauzá as his mentors. "They were my mentors, and what I'm doing now is trying to continue with their tradition," he said.
At 19 he went into the Navy during World War II. He served three years and saw action in nine battles. In the Navy he played alongside musicians from the bands of Benny Goodman and Charlie Spivak and learned more about jazz arranging from the musicians around him. After his discharge in 1945 he used the G.I. Bill to study conducting, orchestration and theory at Juilliard.
Around 1948 he put together his first band, the Picadilly Boys, a name the promoter Federico Pagani came up with. Pagani also booked him for Sunday matinees at the Palladium, the ballroom at 53rd and Broadway that became "the city's mecca for Afro-Caribbean dance music." The group soon grew into the Tito Puente Orchestra. His recordings for Tico and RCA Victor turned out one mambo and cha-cha-chá hit after another. They earned him another of his titles, "King of Mambo."
El Rey del Timbal
Tito helped make the timbales a featured instrument. He played them standing up instead of sitting, out in front of his orchestra. He led the orchestra with power, flash and showmanship. "You need a big personality on-stage," he said. "You can hear something good, but now it's real important what you show."
He surrounded himself with great percussionists, too. His 1956 record Puente in Percussion put him together with Mongo Santamaría, Willie Bobo and Carlos "Patato" Valdés. Later, when Mongo left, a young conguero named Ray Barretto sat in at the Palladium and got the job. He ended up on the session that became Dance Mania (1958), Tito's best-selling RCA record. It sold the most, as NPR put it, because Tito's orchestra was "a dance band." In the '60s the bongó chair went to a teenager from El Barrio, Johnny "Dandy" Rodríguez. He stayed, on and off, for more than 30 years and ended up running the band's business.
"Oye Como Va" and Beyond
Tito wrote more than 400 songs, along with some 2,000 arrangements. He could also play vibraphone, piano and saxophone. His best-known song is "Oye Como Va," from his album El Rey Bravo. According to the historian Max Salazar, Tito built its opening on "Chon Chu Yo," a tune by Israel "Cachao" López.
Santana's band took the song around the world on Abraxas in 1970. At first Tito didn't even know. His wife heard it on the radio in a store. Tito was grateful for the royalties that followed. "I'd like to thank him publicly 'cause he recorded the tune and he gave me credit as the composer of the tune," he said. "He put our music, Latin rock, around the world, man." Santana's band also recorded his "Pa' Los Rumberos," from Cuban Carnival, on Santana III. That put his mambo in front of a whole new rock audience.
Over the years he worked with Celia Cruz, whom he helped introduce to American audiences, with Eddie Palmieri and with jazz players like George Shearing and Woody Herman. In 1991, at 68, he put out his 100th album. He kept touring well into his 70s, sometimes playing up to 300 dates a year. You can also see him on screen, in Woody Allen's Radio Days (1987) and The Mambo Kings (1992).
Timeline
1923Born April 20 in New York City; grows up in Spanish Harlem
1942Joins the Navy at 19, during World War II
1945Studies at Juilliard on the G.I. Bill
Around 1948Forms the Picadilly Boys, which becomes the Tito Puente Orchestra
1956Puente in Percussion and Cuban Carnival
1958Dance Mania
Early 1960sRecords "Oye Como Va"
1979First Grammy, for Homenaje a Beny Moré
1991Releases his 100th album
2000Dies May 31, at 77
Selected Recordings
Puente in Percussion (Tico, 1956): the all-percussion record with Mongo Santamaría, Willie Bobo and Patato
Cuban Carnival (RCA Victor, 1956): his first RCA album, with "Pa' Los Rumberos"
Puente Goes Jazz (RCA Victor, 1956): one of his most successful records of the '50s
Dance Mania (RCA Victor, 1958): his best-selling RCA album, with Ray Barretto on congas
El Rey Bravo (Tico): the original "Oye Como Va"
Homenaje a Beny Moré (Tico, 1978): with Celia Cruz and others, his first Grammy
On Broadway (Concord Picante, 1983): his second Grammy
Live at the Village Gate (Tito Puente's Golden Latin Jazz All-Stars, RMM, 1992): with Paquito D'Rivera, Dave Valentín and Hilton Ruiz
Mambo Birdland (RMM, 1999): his fifth Grammy, closing with "Oye Como Va"
Masterpiece / Obra Maestra (with Eddie Palmieri, RMM, 2000): his last album, a Grammy winner
Awards & Recognition
Tito won six Grammys. Five came in his lifetime: Homenaje a Beny Moré (1979), On Broadway (1984), Mambo Diablo (1986), Lambada Timbales (1991) and Mambo Birdland (2000). The sixth came after his death, for Masterpiece / Obra Maestra with Eddie Palmieri (2001). In 2003 the Recording Academy gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award. He got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1990 and the Smithsonian's Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996. In 1997 he was inducted into the International Jazz Hall of Fame. That same year President Clinton gave him the National Medal of Arts. In 2000 the Library of Congress named him a Living Legend. He also received honorary degrees from SUNY Old Westbury, Long Island University, Hunter College and Berklee.
Legacy
When he died, President Clinton called him "a trailblazer" whose recordings are "classics in the genre he helped define." Tito took the timbales from the back of the band to the front of the stage and made them a featured instrument. He led one of the defining orchestras of the mambo era, wrote a song the whole world knows and played for four U.S. presidents, all as a timbalero from Spanish Harlem. In 1980 he started the Tito Puente Scholarship Foundation to help the young musicians coming up behind him.
In his last weeks he was working on a symphonic arrangement of "Oye Como Va." He fell ill in San Juan before he could play a date with the Puerto Rican Symphony. He died in New York that May, at 77, with a fifth Grammy from February and a new album with Eddie Palmieri just finished. The drummer Mickey Hart said, "As long as people dance, his spirit will never die."
Tito Puente's story is a reminder that the timbales, and Latin percussion as a whole, can carry a musician to the very top of the musical world. If his journey has you inspired to pick up the sticks yourself, CongaChops.com is a great place to start.
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